Harlan Noir
by SassyJ
Summary: Of all the gin joints... Raylan walks into a bar.


He needs a drink. He has two days left on his suspension, and there's this cold, tight feeling in his stomach.

He supposes some of it might be anxiety at how they are going to handle his haircut. Or the lack of it, he reaches around his neck, and slides his hand up to tug a little on his pony-tail. It's faintly ridiculous, he knows, but somehow he can't bring himself to cut it.

Nothing about the last month has been clear cut, or easy, and he's struggling and trying to deny it.

He _needs_ that drink. He could call Tim or Rachel, or both of them. He could even drop by and see Art. Because as much as Art was pissed with him, he was also pleased with him. But that would bring him closer to the office, which is the place he is trying to avoid.

Raylan doesn't think he deserves the praise. He enjoyed it. But on the inside he was sure he didn't deserve it.

So. A man walks into a bar. That's such a goddamn cliché, he really can't think straight any more.

So he's slinking into this dark Lexington bar, a place where no one knows his name, and he's glad of it. He just wants to be alone. He's gotten used to that. The bar's all dark wood and close atmosphere. He likes it like that. Orders his drink, half turns, selecting an empty seat at a table nearby, close to the bar, not too close to the band, in enough shadow where he can see without really being seen, catches a flash of colorful movement and turns back.

She's four feet away from him, in profile, black curls tumble to her shoulders artfully messy, she's wearing this tight, form-fitting dress, glossy, black, on the edge of outrageous, it clings to her full generous curves, he's aware he's staring. It was the scarf in jewel bright colors that caught his eye, floating over her shoulder, flicked back by an impatient hand.

He can smell the danger, it intoxicates him, tugs on his senses and settles in his mind.

He reaches out for the chair and unsteadily slides into it. Studies her hands, long fingers, the way they move, her long straight back, the profile he just make out, in the gloom of the bar. This feeling, it makes him feel angry, excited, he came to drink not to feel.

A profile he knows, or thinks he knows, he tips his hat forward, hunches down a little into himself, hiding his eyes. He's dazed and confused so he pretends that she's not there. He only has to tilt his head back an inch to know that he's lying to himself.

She might be a he. But there's the scent of a woman in his nostrils, and coal dust and a time so long past he's almost sure he might have imagined it.

He dug coal once.

******JUSTIFIED******

Venus leans forward. She is bored, her price in this bustling metropolis is three thousand dollars, yet the client has the ill-breeding to be late. So she drinks and waits.

She is aware of him from the moment he steps up to the bar. She likes them young and pretty. He's not young. But there is true beauty in his face, and that long, lean body and endless legs in tight form-fitting jeans. He leans forward, elbows on the bar, he looks weary with the weight of the world on his broad shoulders, and she takes a moment to check out his ass in the tight jeans.

Perfect.

He picks up his drink and slinks away to a table in the corner. By now she knows he has seen her, and he seems to be having trouble processing the fact. She's fairly certain the source of his confusion and it amuses her. She has kin in Kentucky.

She gets out a mirror to touch up her make-up and study him better. His hat shades his face, until he tilts his head back. She studies the cat-like eyes, narrowed in that beautiful face, seen once and unlikely to be forgotten.

She puts her mirror away. She has no need of it now. She has memorized the features of that handsome face, and she knows she will see him again.

******JUSTIFIED******

He's there almost half an hour, downing drink after drink, watching her move, at one point she uncrosses and re-crosses her legs, slowly, elegantly, he can hear the whisper of stockings brushing against each other, he's so tuned in to her.

She can feel his eyes, watching her, slipping away from time to time to stare blankly at the wall in front of him as though he's angry with himself for looking.

He is. His life is a mess, he can barely cope with what's in front of him, and now this unexpected thing. He doesn't even know what this thing is, just knows that it makes him mad enough to keep drinking long after sense dictated that he should give up and go home.

Home.

He raises his glass.

Puts it down again, and rises to his feet. He is leaving. Now, before he can make a fool of himself.

She moves then. She's waited long enough for her inconsiderate client. And she doesn't want to pass up an opportunity to make contact with him. She stands up then, and moves, just as he gets to his feet.

She's tall in her heels, taller than him, she moves with grace and assurance, and he can feel it somewhere deep in his soul.

Their eyes meet, and he reads knowledge and compassion in them, that calms him even as he feels another blaze of anger, then it passes and she's gone before he can do or say anything. Everything's messed up in his head, he's too drunk to drive back to Harlan, he can walk to his crappy little room above the student bar.

He's forty-two years old and living above a student bar.


End file.
